Tanya Snyder
Tanya became Streetsblog's Capitol Hill editor in September 2010 after covering Congress for Pacifica Radios Washington bureau and for public radio stations around the country. She lives car-free in a transit-oriented and bike-friendly neighborhood of Washington, DC.
Recent Posts
Can Transit Expansion Produce Sprawl Like Highways Do?
| | 6 Comments
Here in the Washington, D.C. area, our Metro system is expanding. A new Silver Line will go all the way to Dulles airport and beyond, into exurban Loudon County. The projected station stops are named for highways, not neighborhoods or landmarks: Reston Parkway, Route 28, Route 606, Route 772. Ten of the 11 new stations […]
T&I Field Hearings Pick Up Where They Left Off
| | No Comments
According to a Transportation Committee staffer, a tentative schedule for the previously postponed field hearings is taking shape. Three hearings were postponed last month when debate ran long (until 4:30 a.m., in fact) on H.R.1, the house bill that cut $61 billion from the FY2011 budget. According to the staffer, details are still being worked […]
Rep. LaTourette Tells Transit Advocates to Ask Congress for What They Need
| | 24 Comments
Transit officials spent the day on Capitol Hill yesterday, meeting with Congressional offices as part of the American Public Transportation Association’s legislative conference. Transportation Committee Chair John Mica suggested they ask members for a six-year bill. Secretary Ray LaHood urged them to ask for support for President Obama’s “big, bold vision” for transportation. Rep. Steve […]
House Passes Three-Week Budget Extension
| | No Comments
The House just voted 271-158 to extend the FY2010 for three more weeks while the two houses of Congress try to reconcile their respective ideas about spending cuts. It wasn’t a party-line vote: 54 Republicans voted against the resolution and 85 Democrats voted for it. The bill cuts $6 billion over its three-week life. If […]
“Grab a Hold of Your Shorts”: Mica and LaHood Talk Transportation Bill
| | 6 Comments
This morning, House Transportation Committee Chair John Mica told transit professionals gathered at the American Public Transportation Association’s legislative conference that he’s still hoping to pass a bill out of the House by May in order to get it signed before September 30, when the current extension of SAFETEA-LU expires. “It’ll be very difficult after that,” he said. […]
Kerry, Hutchison, and Warner Introduce New Infrastructure Bank Bill
| | 1 Comment
Sen. John Kerry (D-MA), along with Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) and Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) just announced that they’re introducing the BUILD Act today, which would create a national infrastructure bank. They’re proposing to start the bank with $10 billion of seed money that would leverage hundreds of billions of dollars, according to their […]
AP: Will Senate Republicans Send Back Their Own States’ TIGER Money?
| | No Comments
TIGER grants, announced last year, hang in the balance as the Senate debates the package of House-passed spending cuts. Congress is about to vote on another extension of the current budget, cutting another $2 billion per week. (Up until now, those “cuts” have mostly been budget items from 2010 that the Democrats weren’t going to ask […]
Cyclists Descend on Capitol Hill, Ask Lawmakers to Preserve Bike Funding
| | 4 Comments
Every year, the cyclists that gather in Washington for the National Bike Summit meet with hundreds of Congressional offices to ask for expanded bike funding. This year, they’re just asking lawmakers not to cut it. With an anti-spending mood prevailing inside the Beltway, bicycling advocates are trying to be realistic. “We haven’t forgotten that there’s […]
Boxer Pushes LaHood on Financing for Transportation
| | 10 Comments
Senator Barbara Boxer got down to brass tacks on transportation funding in a committee hearing yesterday, even as DOT Secretary Ray LaHood remained vague on how to pay for the president’s ambitious proposal. Boxer said she’s not in favor of raising the gas tax, but she’d like it to be indexed to inflation. “We don’t […]
“Mad Men” Stars Have a New Product to Pitch: High-Speed Rail
| | No Comments
Vincent Kartheiser, who plays Pete Campbell on the hit series “Mad Men”, and Rich Sommer, who plays Harry Crane, have teamed up with U.S. PIRG to make a video about high-speed rail. In it, Campbell suggests an ad campaign for trains, which Crane finds ridiculous — trains make so much sense; why would you need […]
Cyclists Gathered at Bike Summit Are Told Not to “Wait for Washington”
| | 1 Comment
“How many people are stuck in traffic on their way to ride a stationary bike in a health club?” If you’ve never heard this line before, you’ve never been in a room with Congressman Earl Blumenauer. It’s the Oregon Democrat’s signature line. He opened his speech at the National Bike Summit by inviting participants to […]
LaHood Kicks Off National Bike Summit
| | 7 Comments
On the first night of the National Bike Summit, Secretary Ray LaHood told an enormous hotel ballroom filled with cycling advocates about his childhood riding bikes in Peoria, Illinois and reminded them that they need to work harder than ever to convince Congress to support cycling. Last year, he captivated the Summit crowd with his […]